


Give Me Two Damn Minutes (And I'll Be fine)

by Parker_Haven_Wuornos



Category: Haven (TV)
Genre: Angst, Angst With A Happyish Ending, Canonical Character Death(It's just wade though), Emotional Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Post-Episode AU s04e07 Lay Me Down
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-10
Updated: 2020-07-10
Packaged: 2021-03-04 22:08:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,569
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25173631
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Parker_Haven_Wuornos/pseuds/Parker_Haven_Wuornos
Summary: “Stop, Duke.” The hand that had been resting on Duke’s back moved to his jaw. “Some people can’t be saved; they have to be stopped.”He was quiet for a long second, staring at Duke. “It was him or you, and I’m glad it was you.”
Relationships: Duke Crocker/Dwight Hendrickson
Comments: 12
Kudos: 26





	Give Me Two Damn Minutes (And I'll Be fine)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [gendernoncompliant](https://archiveofourown.org/users/gendernoncompliant/gifts).



> Happy birthday, dearest  
> If you're reading this and you aren't Ashe, go read their fics and wish them a happy birthday!

The sun has just started to sink when Dwight’s phone rang. He almost didn’t look at it, because if he looked, he’d answer it.

But he looked. He always looked. Even on his worst days, when he most wanted to pack up and leave, throwing his phone into the ocean on his way out of town, he always checked his caller id to make sure it wasn’t important. 

And it’s always important.

It was Duke this time, which was novel enough that Dwight was hopeful when he answered it. His hope didn’t last past Duke’s first jagged syllable.

“Squatch… I need help.”

Dwight tried not to panic as he drove out to a field on the outskirts of town. Dwight knew it was a fairly common camping spot, but he also knew it was the site of a devastating trouble during the last round. Other than that, he couldn’t imagine why Duke wanted to meet him out there.

Duke was waiting for him, and he looked strangely picturesque in the golden light, framed by swaying purple flowers and staring out into the field.

As Dwight got closer, though, he started to worry.

Duke’s posture—usually so relaxed and controlled—was rigid. He stared at the setting sun like it had personally wronged him, unblinking despite its brilliance.

“Duke?” Dwight asked quietly. “What’s going on?”

Duke pointed at his truck, swallowing hard, and Dwight wondered if he couldn’t force any words out.

Dwight walked slowly to Duke’s truck, not sure what to brace himself for, not sure he wanted to find out. Whatever he’d tried to prepare for, it wasn’t a body wrapped in a tarp.

“Holy—” Dwight stepped back, jerking away on instinct.

He thought of the bodies in the morgue, the broken off knife point.

He thought of Jordan, missing in action and not returning his calls.

And he looked back at Duke.

Duke stood slowly. “It was Wade,” He said. “He—” The words cut off. Duke sat back down heavily, like an abruptly cut puppet.

“He killed them?” Dwight asked, because it didn’t seem like Duke would be able to say it anytime soon.

Duke nodded.

Dwight knew the sweep of relief that almost knocked him down next to Duke was inappropriate. What had happened was a terrible thing, and it had happened to Dwight’s _friends._

But he was looking at Duke and all he could think was _Thank god it wasn’t you._

_I didn’t want to be that wrong about you._

Instead of telling Duke any of that, Dwight fixated on tasks. He liked having things to do. Jobs could make even the worst things fade into the background. “What do you need?” He asked.

Duke shrugged.

“You called me,” Dwight reminded him.

Duke wouldn’t look at him, kept his gaze firmly fixed on the field ahead of him.

“Duke…” Dwight approached carefully. He’d seen shock before, but Duke didn’t look like he was in shock. He just looked lost, empty.

“I need to bury him,” Duke said finally, still not looking at Dwight.

That, at least, was something Dwight could accomplish.

“I have couple shovels in the truck,” He said.

When Duke didn’t respond, he went to get them, digging them out from under the various tools and equipment he kept in his truck just in case he needed to cover up a trouble or do some emergency repairs. Lately, though, his job had been less coverup and more management, helping the town cope with whatever chaos had just hit.

This was different. He didn’t know how to help Duke cope with this.

So he handed him a shovel, and he got to work without waiting for Duke to join him.

After a couple minutes, Duke stood up and joined him, and they worked in silence.

“I’m not troubled,” Duke said after a while.

Dwight froze mid-motion. He hadn’t done that particular equation yet, but of course it made sense. Duke had killed his own curse.

“Shit,” Dwight said, not sure what else to say.

Duke just shrugged.

After a minute, Dwight tried again. “I mean, I’m not a fan of your trouble, Duke, but… it existed for a reason. Hell, if Lizzie were still alive—”

“Don’t,” Duke said stiffly. “Don’t finish that thought.”

Dwight fell silent. “I just meant,” He said when the quiet got thicker than the earth they were trying to dig through, “That it served a purpose.”   
“Well it’s gone,” Duke said. He laughed, harsh and humorless. “I can’t be your crutch anymore, or your emergency contact.”

Dwight’s stomach curdled. He’d seen Duke in a lot of different moods. He’d seen what he thought was Duke at the end of his rope. He had never seen this, this raw edge, his voice like broken steel, eyes too bright and a little wild.

He looked, Dwight realized, like a man who’d been fatally injured, who knew he was dying but still wanted to fight.

“Duke?” Dwight said; he finally stopped digging and tried to really look at him.

Duke kept going, his shoulders stiff, motions like a badly piloted puppet He wouldn’t look at Dwight.

Tossing his shovel aside, Dwight stepped forward, and when Duke still wouldn’t look at him, he gripped Duke’s arm, throwing off his digging. “Duke.”

Something changed when he said it the second time. His voice was softer; it would have been barely audible if the field hadn’t been so very still.

The shovel fell from Duke’s hands and he wavered on his feet.

Dwight grabbed Duke’s other shoulder, holding him up. “Duke,” he repeated, trying to keep his tone the same, “Let me do this.”

He expected a fight. Part of him wanted to brace himself for when Duke took a swing at him. Duke was tense under his hands, muscles rigid under the worn fabric of his shirt.

But Duke seemed to melt, some part of him peeling off and drifting away on the very faint breeze that tugged the cloying floral smell around. He nodded and picked up his shovel so he could get out of Dwight’s way.

Dwight had dug a lot of graves for Haven. This wouldn’t be his last. Even as he was cutting further into the ground Wade would disappear into, he was thinking about Jordan and Adam, who would need to be lain to rest.

It felt a little wrong—not that any power on Earth could have gotten him to say this to Duke—knowing that he was burying Jordan’s killer before her.

 _I’m sorry_ , He thought, hoping he could believe she could hear him from a better place, that there was somewhere better to be.

It wasn’t just, but then, things in Haven rarely were. He was finding that to be even more true the deeper he got into his role as Haven’s chief of police. The water here was so muddy it usually looked blacker than an oil slick.

Morbid thoughts kept him occupied until he was satisfied that the grave was complete.

“Let me help,” Duke said when Dwight moved to get the body. He’d been silent while Dwight finished the grave, his eyes fixed in the middle distance.

They rolled Wade’s body into the grave together, flinching simultaneously at the solid _thwack_ of it hitting the ground.

Duke’s skin was grayish and taught. He looked older than Dwight had ever seen him.

“You were the one member of my family I could stand to be around,” Duke said quietly.

Not sure what else to do, Dwight bowed his head for the uncomfortable eulogy.

“You weren’t made for this,” He said fervently. “You should have left. You should have stayed away.”

Duke picked up a shovel and tossed some dirt into the grave, and Dwight took the cue and started to help him refill the hole.

The last gasps of twilight had disappeared by the time they finished. It was fully dark; only a scrap of moonlight illuminated Duke’s sharp features.

“Thanks, Squatch,” He said quietly.

The mask was back on. His tone was almost a joke, but Dwight refused to laugh, refused to let Duke pull him back onto familiar territory.

He said nothing. _You’re welcome. Of course. Anytime._ Any response at all would have been trite bordering on ridiculous, so he left Duke’s gratitude where it was. He didn’t want Duke to say thanks. He wanted him to tell him why he’d called.

No, what he really wanted to know was why Duke had called _him._

That wasn’t an answer Duke was in any shape to give, and Dwight wouldn’t—couldn’t—push him. But even knowing he wouldn’t get his answer, he couldn’t leave it there. Watching Duke was like looking at someone who was scratching stitches. Pretty soon, something would snap and there would be blood and pain.

“You shouldn’t… you shouldn’t be alone right now,” He said, trying to be soft. 

Duke just shrugged. “I’m fine, Squatch.”

Soft, apparently, wasn’t going to cut it. “You just buried your brother.” 

“I just killed my brother,” Duke snapped, but he sounded too exhausted to be truly angry. “I don’t think I get to be sad about it.”

“You can be,” Dwight said quietly. At the same time, he very carefully reached towards Duke.

He was pretty sure he intended to grab Duke’s shoulder like he had before—the same casual contact they’d shared many times before—but the message got mixed up somewhere between his brain and his muscles and bones.

His fingers landed on Duke’s jaw, guiding him to look him in the eye for the first time all night.

It was dark enough for plausible deniability if Dwight mentioned the tear, but he didn’t mention it. He just brushed it away with his thumb.

He wasn’t sure what Duke had wanted when he’d called, but he knew that _he_ wanted Duke to finally melt, finally give up.

“Come home with me,” Duke said.

Dwight’s mouth went chalk dry. For all his stubborn insistence that he wouldn’t leave Duke, that he shouldn’t be alone, Dwight suddenly wasn’t sure if he should go with him. What he’d been aiming for and what Duke was offering seemed like very different things.

“Duke that’s not—”

“Relax, Squatch,” Duke cut him off with a bitter smile. He pulled away with a rough shrug, turning towards his car. “Don’t know what I was thinking.”

Dwight was pretty sure he knew what Duke had been thinking, but he didn’t want to say it, didn’t want to call attention to it, didn’t want to think too hard about what it meant.

It was a rabbit hole he couldn’t afford to go down, couldn’t risk thinking too hard about. Not when Duke still had that wild, glassy look in his eyes.

“Have a good night, Dwight,” Duke said.

His name was strange on Duke’s lips. He couldn’t remember him ever having used it before and it sounded wrong.

Pulled by something he couldn’t quite label, Dwight followed Duke and climbed into the passenger side of his truck.   
Was it a mistake? Dwight wasn’t sure. The muddy water was even darker. Was he going for Duke? Or For himself? Because Duke shouldn’t be alone, or because he didn’t want to be?

Duke stared at him, and Dwight braced himself for a joke about mixed signals or playing hard to get, but Duke must not have had it in him. He put the key in the ignition, and they drove away.

* * *

Duke looked over at Dwight, barely visible in the dark car.

 _What are you doing here?_ He wanted to ask, but the words wouldn’t come. Maybe he didn’t want to know.

Was it pity that had dragged Dwight into the car? The idea made Duke’s skin crawl. If he’d wanted pity, he’d have called Audrey. She might have given sympathy too, a hug if Duke was particularly lucky.

But Duke hadn’t called her. He didn’t want sympathy or kindness; he was a murderer. He’d killed his brother, a crime of biblical proportions that—despite the grave they were leaving behind—still didn’t quite feel real.

None of it felt real, except the way Dwight had looked at him, his hand on Duke’s jaw, the contact a lifeline Duke hadn’t realized he’d needed.

 _Why did I ask him to stay?_ He thought, glancing at the passenger side again. He knew that was why Dwight was here. He showed up at the field because Duke needed him, and he was here because he thought Duke still needed him.

And Duke wasn’t entirely sure he didn’t.

The harbor was empty when Duke parked. The air was familiar, brine and wet wood and the bite of chill that meant the luck they’d had with weather—Caldwell trouble notwithstanding—was about to run out. It cleared the heavy scent of lavender and grave dirt out of his nostrils and some of the darker thoughts out of his head.

They were at the gangplank when Dwight stopped.

Duke had the thought that it was a strange first date, and Dwight was an old-fashioned guy leaving him at his front door without even a kiss.

 _I had a nice time tonight,_ The standard words hovered in Duke’s head, so absurd he could have laughed. Instead it came out as a halting, breathless cough.

“Duke—”

How many times had Dwight said his name? More, Duke thought, than he ever had before in the entire time they’d known each other.

“Do you want to come up?” Duke asked, pleased that his voice was steady, if a little frayed around the edges.

Dwight looked at the ship. “You going to throw me off again?” He asked.

Duke tried to smile. “Can’t anymore, remember?”

Dwight faltered, stricken. “I didn’t—”

Waving him off, Duke tried the smile again, managing it a little more easily. “I know. Someday I’ll be able to laugh about it.”

Despite Duke’s intentions, the words seemed to make Dwight sad, but he followed Duke up the gangplank.

Duke froze before he could go belowdecks. He hadn’t cleaned up.

The floor. The blood. The knife.

It was all still there, waiting for him like a spider trapped under a cup that he couldn’t release. He turned around, pressing his back against the door, blocking Dwight’s path.

Stumbling at the sudden change in trajectory, Dwight stopped a second too late, ending up too close, his nose inches from Duke’s.

He muttered something, trying to pull back, but some madness Duke couldn’t name wanted Dwight to stay right there. With the door at his back and Dwight in front of him there was no getting out, but no one could get in. That was nice. 

Safe, Duke realized belatedly. He felt safe.

He also realized that he’d grabbed the front of Dwight’s shirt so he couldn’t leave. Dwight was staring at his hand as if waiting for it to tell him why it was there.

Duke let go, smoothing over where he’d left wrinkles in the fabric. Seconds later, he realized that was still a problem because he was still touching Dwight.

It was ridiculous. Everything was ridiculous. He’d stopped Dwight from going inside because there was blood all over his floor. Wade’s blood.

And Dwight had helped him bury Wade, and then had come back here with him, and he was still staring at Duke.

Duke laughed. His shoulders shook. He was crying and Dwight was still right there and Duke wanted him to go the fuck away, but he didn’t want him to leave, not ever.

Instead of saying his name for the hundredth time—Duke had almost been hoping he would, he liked the sound—Dwight reached out carefully, stopping when his hands were inches from Duke’s shoulders.

He looked like he was trying to calm a wild animal. Duke could picture Dwight crouched down in some small, dirty place, reaching out just like this to a stray dog or feral cat that had gotten itself hurt. It made him laugh again, thinking that in this case he was the stray, the unwanted wild thing.

Or not unwanted, because Dwight was here. 

Duke wasn’t sure what to do with gentleness. It had been offered to him so rarely that he’d convinced himself he didn’t like it, but if that were true, he should hate the look in Dwight’s eyes as he held him. He didn’t.

He didn’t hate it at all.

He leaned closer, letting himself rest some of his weight on Dwight while the laughter and the shaking subsided, and then staying there when the tears started.

Finally, he was steady enough to speak. “We, uh, we can’t go down there. The—”

He cut off again before he could say “the blood”. He didn’t want to think about blood or eyes or knives.

“I’ll help you clean it,” Dwight said. “Tomorrow, when… when it’s a better time.”

Duke wanted to laugh. Tomorrow, Wade would still be dead, so would Jordan and whoever else Wade had killed for a cheap high, and Duke would still be untroubled.

But still, it was nice that Dwight wanted to give Duke his kitchen back, and he wouldn’t pass up the help. Otherwise he wasn’t sure that he wouldn’t take one look at the blood and bail, leaving the Rouge to sink into the harbor while Duke drove until his car died.

 _I could go now,_ He thought. He’d kept his promise to his father; he’d come back to Haven. He’d kept it a hundred times over with all he’d done to try and stop the troubles.

He almost started laughing again, thinking about his father. Simon had always thought Duke was the family fuckup, but damn if he hadn’t outdone them all by being the one to get rid of the family curse.

“Still with me?” Dwight asked.

“Huh? Oh, uh, yeah. Just thinking.”

“Might not be a road you want to go down.”

There it was again, the gentleness. Duke let himself accept it, just for now.

“Thanks,” He finally said. “For helping me… clean up.”

“That’s what I do,” Dwight said with an unhappy smile.

“Not like this,” Duke said, hoping Dwight knew that he saw how far above and beyond Dwight went, not just for him tonight, but all the time. For Audrey and Nathan and the whole undeserving town.

Dwight’s smile softened around the edges. “Yeah, Duke,” He said, and Duke figured that he was as unused to gratitude as Duke was to gentleness, so he didn’t begrudge the lousy acceptance.

They made their way back to the main part of the deck. At some point Duke had added another chair, though he didn’t have guests on the Rouge often. Dwight made himself at home easily, sitting down and ignoring the half-full coffeepot Duke had abandoned earlier.

Duke sat across from him and stared out at the water, not sure what he should do now. He thought, under different circumstances, this would be nice. He’d be lying if he tried to say that he’d never imagined doing this with Dwight, but it all felt wrong now, like eating a favorite food that had been left in the sun too long.

He noticed the careful distance Dwight put between them and wasn’t sure how to read it. Again, the thought of this being some kind of misguided attempt at chivalry crossed his mind, but it no longer made him want to laugh. The hysterics, apparently, had passed. In their wake, they left a vast emptiness.

He remembered the first time he’d been alone at sea. The day after he’d gotten the Rouge he’d taken off, afraid someone would try to take her back if he stayed any longer. At some point hours later, he’d looked up and realized he couldn’t see anything. There was no land anywhere, and he was the only person for god knew how many miles.

Now, barely a foot away from Dwight, he felt that same aching isolation.

The crushing weight of it made it hard to breathe.

“I should have saved him,” Duke said. He spoke to the deck because he couldn’t have said it if he’d been looking at Dwight’s face. “I could have—”

“What?” Dwight asked. “Predicted that he’d go crazy with bloodlust the second he found out about your trouble?”

Duke flinched. “He wasn’t—” But he stopped. He wasn’t sure what Wade hadn’t been. He wasn’t sure he’d known Wade at all, if he hadn’t seen the edge he’d been walking on.

“I thought I could protect him,” Duke said. “If I didn’t tell him—” Duke choked off. “Christ, I’m just like them.”

His breaths were coming fast again, the lump in his throat getting too large to swallow around. Goddamn it, he was _not_ going to cry again.

But his head wouldn’t stop showing him every time someone had lied to him. The tumultuous way he’d discovered his trouble, Evi getting shot, Dwight flying over the side of his boat while Duke was blurring with the intensity of the bloodrush. No one would have had to get hurt if Vince or Dave or his father or the fucking Rev or _anyone_ had just told him the truth.

Maybe no one would have gotten hurt if he’d just told Wade.

He could hear a strange, strangled sound and realized belatedly that he was making it, that he was fighting the sobs so hard he was making a sound that was somehow worse, more revealing.

Dwight put his hand on Duke’s back and he forced himself to focus on that, to feel the weight of it, to trace the pattern of his hand as it smoothed down his spine, stopping at the exact center to circle back up.

There was a weird sort of propriety to it, and distantly Duke found the humor in Dwight’s stubborn refusal to cross lines Duke wasn’t even drawing. Lines he would have happily led him across if he were just a little less wrecked.

After a few long seconds of carefully counted breaths, of noting the way the air smelled—nighttime and saltwater and home—and grounding himself in the warmth of Dwight’s palm, Duke could breathe again.

“There was nothing you could do,” Dwight said, as if he didn’t think it needed to be said. “Some people, Duke… some people get power and can’t imagine not using it.”

He looked up in time to see the faraway look in Dwight’s eyes and wondered who he was talking about, what he was remembering.

He didn’t have it in him to ask though.

“He had to be stopped,” Dwight said. “He killed… Duke he killed good people. Not because he had to, not to save other people, not because there was no choice, but because he wanted to. Because he liked the feeling. Because he could.”

“He wasn’t—” Duke stopped again. He wanted to say that Wade wasn’t all bad but wasn’t sure he could make that argument.

Wade had killed Dwight’s friends.

“I’m sorry,” Duke said after a minute. He was beginning to lose count of the night’s apologies. “For Jordan.”

Dwight nodded. “She was… complicated. But she was good.”

Duke wasn’t sure what to say. He hadn’t known her well, and what he had known hadn’t impressed him.

But now she was dead, and he’d never get to know.

The ache settled in again. Exhaustion and pain and the weight of everything came back in a rush he couldn’t bear. Every time he thought he’d gotten past it, a new wave came, striking him down in a different way. “Maybe if I’d—”

“Stop, Duke.” The hand that had been resting on Duke’s back moved to his jaw. “Some people can’t be saved; they have to be stopped.”

He was quiet for a long second, staring at Duke. “It was him or you, and I’m glad it was you.”

Duke kissed Dwight.

He didn’t realize until after it was already happening that the tension had snapped, the weight he’d been under broke something inside him and he caved into Dwight. Despite all the care and manners from earlier, Dwight didn’t fight him.

All that was left was the gentleness and Duke wanted more of it. He wanted all of it. This, if nothing else, would make him forget.

Dwight was smart and loyal and _good_ and he wanted Duke to be the one that survived, and Duke had to believe he was right. As long as Dwight believed in him, he could believe in himself, just long enough to get through the night.

Dwight pulled away. “Duke.”

He was starting to hate the way Dwight said his name. The patience, the kindness. He didn’t want those things in words anymore.

“We shouldn’t… you’re not—”

“What, Squatch?” He asked, voice breaking with desperation. “What am I not?”

The tattered remains of his dignity were spilling out between them. Duke had nothing left. He couldn’t keep himself upright anymore. He folded over, resting his elbows on his knees and his face in his hands.

“You’re not okay,” Dwight said. “I can’t…I can’t give you that.”

Duke laughed like he had a knife stuck in his throat. “I’m not asking you to make me okay,” He lied.

He’d just wanted time. A few minutes, maybe, where he could be someone Dwight cared about, because that was a better person than Duke Crocker.

“Duke…”   
“Stop _fucking_ saying that,” He snapped.

“I’m not doing this when you’re fucked up,” Dwight said after a moment.

“I’m always fucked up,” Duke said, and the honesty hurt on its way out. He was supposed to be fine. He was always fine when someone asked, but he figured Dwight should know what he was saying.

If he couldn’t do this when Duke was fucked up, they couldn’t do this at all.

Dwight sighed. “This is… Duke this is for your own good. You can’t—”

“And you get to decide that?” Duke asked.

“Fine then,” Dwight snapped, and Duke thought it might be the first time he’d seen him genuinely mad about something. “Maybe this is for me. Maybe I don’t want to have to deal with you changing your mind when the smoke clears.”

Duke flinched away. He turned away from Dwight, staring out at the water to clear his head before he looked back and really studied the man in front of him.

“Why’d you call me?” Dwight asked, and Duke knew what he was asking, that it wasn’t just ‘why me?’ it was ‘what did you want?’ and ‘what did you expect?’. 

He thought hard. Dwight was the guy who fixed things. The one who made them disappear. Had he wanted to be fixed? Wanted to disappear?

He did want both of those things, but he would take them for himself, just as he’d always done; he didn’t want them given by anyone else.

Duke considered blowing off the question, making it a joke. Dwight would leave and whenever a trouble hit next, they would work together and pretend that this night and all its madness hadn’t happened.

They would pretend that they hadn’t spent two minutes kissing under the stars and forgetting.

“I wanted to see you,” Duke said, finally releasing the thought that had stuck in his brain like a fly in a spider’s web—thrashing and mad—from the moment he’d pulled the knife out of Wade, the moment he had seen blood on his hand that didn’t soak in.

“I didn’t want help,” He said. “I was glad that you did but… I just wanted you there.”

There weren’t right answers to the question Dwight had asked, but there were wrong ones and there were true ones. Duke had offered a true one, which was all he had.

Dwight was quiet, not looking at Duke anymore. He stared over the side of the boat, past the harbor and towards the town.

“I don’t want to take advantage,” Dwight said.

Duke laughed, a real one this time, because it really was funny. Sure, it was a twisted sort of funny, but what wasn’t in this godforsaken town?

After a moment, Dwight joined him, a soft chuckle rather than a genuine laugh, but more than Duke had been expecting. 

Carefully, Duke took Dwight’s hand, studying callouses and scars rather than looking at him. “You aren’t,” He finally said.

Dwight’s fingers curled ever so slightly around Duke’s. “It’s still a bad time.”

“Name a better time,” Duke said, with his free hand, he gestured widely, indicating the town, the troubles, the unseen ticking clock that always seemed to be hovering over them.

Dwight half-nodded, half-shrugged, acknowledging it.

Carefully, he lifted Duke’s hand and leaned his head against it. It was an odd gesture, intimate and distant at once. Not exactly what Duke wanted, but more than nothing.

“You could leave,” Dwight said. 

Duke pulled his hand away, snapping whatever tentative connection they’d made. _Do you want me to?_ He wanted to ask, but even with everything he’d said tonight, that was still too honest. “You could leave too,” Duke said after a minute, pretending he didn’t hear the double meaning. 

Dwight studied him without answering.

“There’s nothing keeping you here,” Duke reminded him. They were the same words he’d used twenty years ago with Nathan. Ignoring the uncomfortable similarity, he went on. “You’d be safer somewhere with fewer guns.”

“We won’t. We need to see this through.”

Duke had wanted to hear Dwight refer to them as a ‘we’ for a long time, but he was unsatisfied now that it’d happened.

He didn’t want to think about obligations. He didn’t want to make decisions. He didn’t want to decide whether he was leaving or staying, he didn’t want to have to convince Dwight they were a chance worth taking. He worn out. Worn out and restless and angry and sad and a million other things he couldn’t do anything about.

He was so fucking tired, but there was a puddle of blood between him and his bed.

“You already stayed, Duke. You did the hard part.”

“Does that mean it gets easier?” Duke asked. Somewhere between his head and his mouth, the words stopped being a joke. 

Dwight shrugged and smiled humorlessly. “I’ll let you know.”

The silence that fit itself between them was less oppressive than their others, punctuated with the quiet slap of waves against the hull. He wondered what Dwight was thinking about, but wasn’t sure how to ask. 

“Earlier,” Dwight started. “I—”

“Don’t,” Duke said quickly.

He had called Dwight because he’d wanted him to be there. Because he’d needed some stability some semblance of sanity ever since the fight, and Dwight really was the only person left who could offer that. But now that they were sitting here, now that they’d kissed and Dwight had mentioned leaving and the air had gotten so heavy he could choke on it, Duke didn’t think they could close the distance anymore.

He had tried.

And just like protecting Vanessa, and Evi, and Wade, he had failed.

“Duke—”

“Seriously, Squatch, stop with the name.” It was a bad joke, not even really funny, but it made him feel normal. The armor was sliding back into place. It didn’t fit well—never really had—but at least it was there.

He was fine.

“I’m trying—” Dwight started again, but Duke cut him off.

“It’s fine. You’re right, I was just messed up earlier. Head’s clear now, all good. You can go h—”

Dwight grabbed him by the collar of his shirt and pulled him forward, nearly out of his chair—goddamn that man was strong—and kissed him.

“Shut up,” Dwight said, letting him go. “And listen.”

Even without instruction, Duke would have been too stunned to speak.

“I’m not…” He dragged a hand through his hair. “Duke, I’m not in this for halves. I don’t _do_ this. Annie was the last… whatever. What I’m trying to say is I won’t do this if you need a crutch or an emergency contact. I can’t. Not if it’s you.”

Duke’s own words from hours ago were a slap in the face, but one he needed, because other parts of Dwight’s monologue—the most Duke had heard him speak at one time—were floating past him, barely comprehended.

_Not if it’s you._

_Not in this for halves._

“I don’t want to wait around until the troubles finally find a way to kill us,” Dwight said, standing up.

That, at least, registered in a way Duke could make sense of. He stood too, partly to make sure he was still eye level with Dwight, and partly because he wanted to stay close.

Leaning in, Dwight kissed him again, soft this time. Gentle.

“But not tonight,” Dwight said, before Duke could even try to speak, or keep kissing him.

He wanted to ask why, but he understood. He knew what it was to be the last resort. The person someone called when they’d exhausted everything else. 

“Just… call me when you know.” Dwight almost smiled.

“What if I already know?” Duke asked.

Dwight looked down, and Duke watched the war on his face. The hope chasing agony and frustration.

“Then call me tomorrow.” He walked away.

Duke watched until Dwight had vanished into the darkness. Something settled, a calm that only came from being around someone who didn’t have to pretend to be fine.

He fell asleep on the deck with his phone in his hand.


End file.
